Did state prison overhaul drive up crime?

Share this:

Gearing up to run for governor next year, Abel Maldonado went on a statewide, 10-stop barnstorming tour this month. The centerpiece was his opposition to realignment, Gov. Jerry Brown’s solution to state-prison overcrowding, and his promise to repeal it with a November ballot initiative.

Maldonado, a former lieutenant governor, says realignment — in which the state is shifting responsibility for thousands of lower-level offenders to counties — is increasing crime.

But supporters of the program, including San Francisco leaders, say there’s no evidence of that, and that realignment has given them a chance to emphasize rehabilitation over incarceration.

The debate is a complicated and animated one, featuring dueling statistics and anecdotes — but criminal justice experts say there’s no reliable study yet on the impact of realignment.

For more on the debate — and Maldonado’s controversial citing of individual murder cases as proof of his cause — read here.